WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 637 - Matt Sweeney

Episode Date: September 13, 2015

You’ve probably heard something Matt Sweeney recorded, even if you don’t immediately recognize the name Matt Sweeney. As Marc discovers in this conversation, Matt has left his fingerprints all over the last 20 years of rock music as a member of several bands, a sought-after session guitarist, an unlikely A & R man, and a guy who is a lot of fun to be around. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category,

and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. Lock the gates! Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers, what the fuck buddies, what the fucksters, what the fuckadelics?

What's happening? It's Mark Maron. This is WTF. This is my podcast. How are you? Today on the show is the amazing Matt Sweeney. Don't know who Matt Sweeney is? You should.

I'll explain it to you later. All right? Okay, but let's do this now. A couple things. Australia, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, October 16th and around there. all right okay but let's do this now couple things australia sydney melbourne brisbane october 16th and and around there go to wtfpod.com go to my calendar and you can get informed on when i'm going to be there things are looking up everything's okay i'm looking forward to come to australia i think i'll be worth it i'm going to put on a good show i'll give you i'll give you the extra added

and i'll hang out and press the flash and take some pictures and hold some babies if you'd like i'm not encouraging anyone to bring babies to the show all right that was a troublesome september 19th i'll be at pod fest and my guests on the live podcast will be uh los angeles radio legend jim ladd and los angeles other radio legend uh fraser sm Los Angeles other radio legend Fraser Smith. We're going to talk about the old days back when podcasting was some sort of weird futuristic idea that no one even came up with. What? Doing a prerecorded radio show in your house? Come on. That's crazy talk.

What? The president of the United States is going to come to your house no way you're out of your fucking mind man you should be on medicine what else oh yeah john hodgman was supposed to come on we were going to hang out and do something because he's got a thing going on and i like to help my pals i like mr hodgman hodgman and i've been through some shit i lost two of his fucking episodes before we finally nailed one i didn't lose one i lost one the other one stunk not because of him because of the situation it was a live situation but then we got a good one but he's out and about he's out on the road he's on tour with his new show vacation land over the weekend it kicked off but you can see him all

over the country for the next few weeks go to john hodgman.com slash tour to see the hodge man so matt sweeney all right here's the deal with matt sweeney blake mills matt sweeney's a guitar player but he's also a guy that i think he's a guy that people like to have around and that's not a bad quality blake mills said you and matt sweeney got to hang out i'm like who's matt sweeney so i start looking into matt sweeney he does this thing for on youtube for vice I believe called guitar moves and it's just him sitting with a guitar player him trying to learn shit from the guitar player I can appreciate that Matt seems like a pretty good guitar player but I still don't know who he is then I find out Matt's in this band called Chavez I don't fucking know anything about Chavez because I'm not late to the party I just

missed the fucking party completely but fortunately now the party's ongoing there's no more missing the party so i get chavez greatest hits which is a you know like a double cd i listened to that sort of over and over again in florida it's kind of punk rock kind of art rock kind of math rock whatever you want to call it it's a thing so then i'm like so now i'm in the matt sweeney situation i understand matt sween. And then I remember I got this fucking record from Drag City by Matt Sweeney and Bonnie Prince Billy, Will Oldham. I got a lot of Will Oldham records. I can only take so many at a time.

I listen to them slowly. But the Matt Sweeney, Will Oldham record, Superwolf is a fucking great record. It's one of those records. I didn't really know who Matt Sweeney was. I knew a little bit about Will Oldham and Bonnie Prince prince billy but super wolf i put it on without knowing anything and i'm like what is this magical piece of fucking wax god damn it what is this the super wolf album is fucking monumental it's one of the best records i fucking have i love that goddamn record and that's a

matt sweeney will oldham joint that thing so now i'm a little more hip to matt sweeney then i finally meet him and man like we hung out in new york he went with me we went to an app shop we played some guitar he showed me some burnside licks and then we hung out he's part owner of a fucking veggie burger down there in the east village called superiority burger but he's one of those dudes you know you know those dudes you meet in your life are you like that i wonder what that dude's up to let's call him up and see what's going on with him he's that guy i've never been that guy no one has ever said man maybe we should call marin and have him come that's never happened unless it was out of sympathy but sweeney seems

like one of those cats where it's sort of like yeah I kind of want to hang around with that guy he seems cool he may not cop to that but I think that's uh I think that's sort of who he is but he's got some fucking stories man because he he was sort of around it he's like he's kind of like I don't know how you describe it but shit just happens to him and they and they're pretty important somehow and he makes great music and then i find out from him that you know he was involved he's involved with the endless boogie record that he's involved with um like you know him and blake are buddies he played he it's crazy you you just have to listen to it and then he just told me that he's

part of this other thing that of course i maybe you pitchfork readers know about this ship. I don't fucking know about shit. I don't know about anything. But this Soldiers of Fortune record, which is like some super group of alt people, Kid Millions, Barry London, Jesper Eklo, Brad Trow, Mike Bones. I didn't know any of those people until this morning. Brad Trow, Mike Bones. I didn't know any of those people until this morning. But anyways, I'm happy Matt and I are friends.

He sends me music to listen to, and we chit-chat about shit, about guitars and things. He's a good cat, and this was a fun talk. Before I bring you Matt Sweeney, the music on today's show is some of my guitar noodling that's been mixed with full instrumentation by this dude, DJ Copley. He's on Twitter as WebPuppy45 if you want to check out his stuff. Matt Sweeney, now. It's a night for the whole family.

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18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. Ow. I've had this. This is like the $90 chocolate yes from where the fuck do they make this

they make it in Brooklyn right and I'm friends with the guys and I asked them because they would give it they give this shit to me for free and I got addicted to it so I was eating like two a day

I was like working on a record so like I was hooked that's how they get you yeah exactly you're friends yeah but like so like here's the thing about

about you Matt Sweeney yes who the fuck aren't you friends with uh i mean i like you you got a chocolate connection you can't you know johnny cash i'm old sam dylan taught you how to play guitar not even a dylan that plays guitar he's the best guitar player dylan sam dylan he's he's incredible how'd you know that guy he went to hampshire college uh you went to Hampshire? No, I went to Northwestern, but my three best friends from New Jersey all went to Hampshire College, all kind of separately. You grew up in New Jersey? Uh-huh, in Maplewood and South Orange.

My dad taught at Seton Hall University. What did he teach? He was Chaucer. He's all Chaucer? Just Canterbury Tales all day long? I mean, that and classics. Medieval English was his specialty. And he taught there for 50 years.

And by the end, he just got to do an honors class where he would take him around the world. Yeah, and he would have like a month-long trip that he would take a class to and stuff. So you grew up in academia? Yeah, I did. And your mom, was she a teacher? My mom met my dad when she was teaching at Seton Hall,

but then she became a lawyer and then became a judge. Your mom's a judge? Federal judge. To this day? To this day. And your dad's an academic, a scholar. He's no longer with us, but he, yeah, he was, well, he was an academic, but he never published.

He was a Jesuit, right? Yeah. And in 1957, he left, which was Vatican II. Does anybody know about Vatican II? Sure. I mean, I'll pretend like I do. I remember it being something.

The Catholic Church changed all the rules and they kind of got lax and they got rid of the Latin Mass and they got rid of everything that my dad was interested in, like all the kind of incense and kind of...

All the witchcraft. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, all that. Because the Jesuits are into the... what's the word? Not magic with a K, but spiritual and arcane. The swinging orbs. The smoking orbs.

So he bails, and he's 27, and he moves to Bleecker and McDougal in 1957. Gets his mind blown. A virgin. A virgin Jesuit moves to that place. To Jazzland. Oh, gets his mind blown. A virgin. A virgin Jesuit moves to that, to jazz land. Yeah, yeah. And he got a tenured position at Seton Hall at a really young age. And so he just, he never cared about publishing. He never, he just.

Wrote it out. Wrote it out. And he was a bagpiper. He was really into music. And he played in like 10 different bands. The bagpipes? Yes. Did he play on ACDC's first album? No, because I don't really he was a bagpiper he was really into music and he played in like 10 different bands the bagpipes yes did he play on acdc's first album no because i don't really think those are bagpipes i i don't have you studied it there's like there's the way that it starts in that in that song they it sounds like a uh it sounds like a synthesizer to me long way to the

top if you want to rock and roll yeah yeah matt sweeney here on this show has said that it's a synthesizer i think i mean but it's okay i just want you to come down one side the other bagpipe or synthesizer i think that on the record is a synthesizer but i know that bon scott used to play the bagpipe live and apparently it was really difficult and it was a huge chore for him and it was like a property really a huge chore for a dwarf alcoholic to play the bagpipes. It was a little rough. It winded the little man. Yeah, so I grew up around music and stuff. But that's very sophisticated, you know, highbrow upbringing. It was cool.

They weren't into rock and roll, which was really nice. But what was your first instrument? Did you learn to play? Really? Yeah. Clarinet player. Well, you know, because back did you learn to play that really yeah clarinet player well you know like because back when they when you had to play an instrument in schools yeah you know sure i i think my dad kind of chose it for me yeah i think uh my brother played clarinet

briefly you got to wet your reed yeah yeah and then uh blow a few tunes out did you have any uh proclivity to it or you know i could I couldn't read music well but I could memorize anything so I kind of got far just bullshitting. So I could, I sat like in first chair, whatever that means. Sure.

I could play but I really didn't know what I was reading. I would just like hear it once and then just kind of figure it out. Really? So you had that and you could play the clarinet?

Yeah, yeah. You got brothers and sisters? I got an older brother who lives in LA who makes, he plays plays music as well he does music for kitchen nightmares yeah well i don't know them you know kitchen no i don't tv show do you oh really gordon ramsay gordon ramsay he's the guy going like yeah yeah when gordon ramsay loses his shit and yells at people to get it together yes and storms out into the street your brother's music comes in you can watch that go that's my bro yes he does all those cues oh god bless him

for helping out so all right so you're in new jersey so that means you're close to hoboken you're close to new york that's correct you have access how old are you now i'm 45 all right so you're a little younger than me but we're old guys kind of yeah yeah but you were all you know you were you're old enough to have been young enough to sort of get into the end of the punk rock shit here absolutely um yeah i was really lucky because so you know i was in high school from like 80 you know in the mid 80s when everything sucked everything i thought was terrible but but there's really i was i was there in the late 70s that was better a little bit but it's kind of shitty too but the what i mean by that is that there's an underground like there's a really there is such a need like what what was mainstream was so terrible

that there's this need for an underground and there was tons of great music so like i got into hardcore music kind of via skateboarding and that so i got well that's when sort of when that happened because i remember when i was in high school from like 77 to 81, like disco, we saw it die, but punk didn't integrate until later. So we got new wave was what the mainstream music became. And then mainstream rock was like, I was in high school when the first Van Halen album came out. The greatest. Right.

And the first Dire Straits album came out. And Foreigner was around. There was a lot of hot-blooded. I think that was early on. I love that shit, actually. Do you? I really love Foreigner. I think it's music I liked when I was a little kid.

I heard it at the amusement park, and I remember. Sure, man. Feels like the first time. Oh, yeah. So you're in high school, and you're processing the skate shit. Yeah, yeah. I see a picture of this band. It's a bunch of guys, and it says the Sun City Girls,

and it just kind of... And I think I saw a picture of the Butthole Surfers, and that was it. I was like, I have to know what this stuff is. The Butthole Surfer does require that of you. It's like, what is that? Yeah, and this is like 83 or 84, and you're like... How old are you?

At that point, I'm 13. Oh, my God. Yeah, it was... You were enchanted. Completely. And I'd already gotten into music, and I really like rush and led zeppelin and stuff like that and i was already playing music but when i heard that stuff it just blew my mind and i really got into that stuff so then by the end of high school i had a band and we got to like we got to open up for

sonic youth you know when i was which band was that we were called skunk that was like famous though like aren't you isn't that relatively well known we're goofy we're we're well we were good i mean i i i cringe when i when i hear it although the guitar stuff is really cool but we were we didn't know what we were we were really really young right and and uh it was kind of very minneapolis sounding very like who's screwed do that and replacements and soul asylum who were actually they were so well that sounds lame actually what but i don't want to say they were actually great but in the 80s they were so incredible that band in particular i remember because i grew up in this arena rock got into punk rock and then i saw soul asylum open up for who's gradoo and they kind of sounded like

arrowsmith or something like that but sure but they were so like tight and violent little neutered really violent they were bad really they were so good and violent. Little neutered. Really? No, they were bad ass. Really? They were so good. And ask anybody who was there, they will swear that Soul Asylum in 1986 was the best kind of post-punk band going. No, I know that,

but then there's the whole sort of like, well, what the fuck happened? I don't know. It seemed like a cultural turn more than a turn of them as a band. Yeah, I mean, it was weird. Actually, also when you're in high school, you love a band and then you don't like a band anymore.

Yeah. They make one lame move. You're like, oh my God, fuck them. But how much older is your brother? My brother's two years older. He was more straight, kind of like he had Jersey Shore type buddies and stuff like that. So he was playing- Springsteen?

That kind of stuff. His band was like yeah they were like they would play high school dance oh he had a band yeah he was he's an incredible drummer he like he was like the rush guy he like worked a couple of summers got the giant neil pert rush did he get a gong uh yeah we had the whole fucking thing yeah he smoked he was he was like the most he was like the drummer in town so then did he play alone at home with earphones on? A little bit. He always had kids to play with him.

We had like the rock house. We had the house that my dad was like, we didn't have a lot of money, but he was like, if you want to play sports or do music, I'll foot the bill. And then my parents divorced in high school and my dad kind of was sort of depressed and the house i was just completely unsupervised and completely and it's amazing and luckily i wasn't into drugs or

anything like that i was just into music and so it my house was just this what your dad was just what in the room he was kind of like he was puttering in the basement and then and you know hanging out with his with his bagpiper buddies and And he just was kind of like... So your dad was sad? He was sad. Wandering about and occasionally would play bagpipes with some other men. Yeah, pretty much. Oh, man. But it was a really great scene.

So we got to, you know, I got to play tons and tons and tons of music and kind of figure stuff out. And I got to like hate on my brother's friends who were like kind of technical kind of rock jocks. Yeah. But then at the same time, because I was kind of good at memorizing stuff i would like act like i hated them and watch them play and then like yeah you still do that you make you make short uh pieces where you do that yeah i mean yeah kind of guitar moves right yeah yeah it's sort of you going like oh fuck i'm playing with this guy that's some of those some of those like the gibbons one was insane well it was it was kind of weird and sad to see billy get sort of loopy like he got his face all got all red from the

wine it's this one moment he turns you see him he goes done deal but he's incredible i mean that was well you're asking them how i know a lot of people and and other than the fact that i was i started young playing in bands you know that and making records at a pretty young age so i got to meet a lot of people that way and then talk about skunk though because like skunk is amazing oh my god but like you were what 14 15 when when yeah when i started playing with those dudes what what guitar are you playing i had what was i had like a yamaha guitar and then i didn't i I got a Les Paul my freshman year in college. Black one?

I got a black one, yeah, yeah. I got, what are they called? Custom? Black Beauties, yeah, yeah. Yeah, two gold humbuckers? Yep, yep. That's not a punk rock guitar. No, but the thing is, by the time that we started doing a band,

we'd already kind of been punk hardcore as we knew it, had kind of the first wave had run their course meaning meaning black flag had broken up right that's one way of putting it you know i mean and like uh i think you talked with with uh with kirk from the meat puppets about this just like this things had moved on so by the time that i was playing a band we were kind of post-punk and into like arena rock and into like guitar solos and stuff like that really yeah yeah and like um it was really goofy like which guys like we covered iron maiden knowing that it was not cool to cover iron maiden so there is ironic it was but we loved it you know what i mean like

it was but for the audience you knew that it was yeah yeah we were kind of pushing it like a band like red cross at the time was like our favorite was one of our favorite bands right um and again they were really retro and they were they would cover kiss songs yeah but they were kind of pushing it. A band like Red Cross at the time was one of our favorite bands. Right. And again, they were really retro, and they would cover Kiss songs and stuff. But they were one of the first punk bands. Right. So it was cool. It was cool. They can take the piss out of this by playing it perfectly.

Yeah, kind of. Yeah. And again, there was a guy called Andrew Weiss who was Ween's guy. Us and Ween both got recorded by this guy named Andrew Weiss. This is Skunk? This is Skunk, yeah. I met Ween when we were in high school. Are you a Ween fan? They like us and Ween both got recorded by this guy named Andrew Weiss. This is Skunk? This is Skunk, yeah. I met Ween when we were in high school. Are you a Ween fan? They were in high school?

You know, I have not entered the world completely. Oh my God. But. Watch the guitar moves I did. I did, I watched it. Did you watch one with Mickey from Ween? Yeah, he's great. Yeah, he's like.

He's like a wizard. Yeah, I mean, and they were, they were like our favorite band and we kind of came up with them you know and uh they about they were kids too they were like a year younger yeah and and they started when they're like 13 or something like that i met them when when they were like 15 or 16 all through this guy andrew and trenton um new jersey in jersey yeah this is all jersey jersey weird diy stuff you know what i mean? Yeah. Kind of post-punk, kind of like City Gardens we played a lot at. Maxwell's we played a lot at. Yeah, what's the story over at Maxwell's?

You were like a high school band playing at Maxwell's. Yeah. I mean, yeah. And we were such dicks. Oh, my God. We were such assholes. You know, I played Yolo Tango's Hanukkah Weeks. Yes.

Yeah. And you got to tell me the story again about how Ira had to show you how to. What was that about? Poor Ira had to. Okay, so Steve, the owner of Maxwell's, really likes skunk for some reason. Yeah, yeah. And he's like, you guys have to get a sound guy because we're really loud. And he knew that we were going to go on tour.

And he goes, do you have a buddy who can do your sound? We were like, sure. So we got were going to go on tour. And he goes, you have a buddy who's going to, who can do your sound? We were like, sure. So we got my friend Paul, um, to come to Maxwell's. He's like, yeah,

I'll, he's like, I'll have our house sound guy, teach your guy how to do sound. I'll give you guys an afternoon. Meanwhile, like if I were Ira, I don't think that there's a note of skunks music that he would like.

We were like kind of, I think everything that he hated, you know, because we were like really obnoxious and like, again, doing our maiden songs and shit like that. And, and like, uh, I think everything that he hated, you know, because we were like really obnoxious and like, again, doing Iron Maiden songs and shit like that. And like, so he has to show up and he was just like so bummed. He was a sound guy?

Yeah, yeah. He had to show up and show our friend who didn't know anything about sound. And so we were just like, we just made noise and played like awful heavy metal for like three hours. And knowing, we knew exactly how much he hated it. I wonder if he remembers that. All right, so you're doing Skunk. Okay, so I'm doing it.

You find some success. I mean, sort of. I mean, like with six, I'm getting to open up for, I think our first real show was opening for Sonic Youth and Dinosaur. That's a pretty big show. Where was that?

In Jersey? That was at City Gardens. And then we played with Sonic Youth at CB's. And at that time it was really for me exciting because like 86 87 all those all the bands that we really liked just made these really great records like uh Dinosaur made You're Living All Over Me which is like this great record yeah Sonic Youth made Sister you know like all these bands were really kind of peaking you know and I was I'm like in high school just like all i cared about was this stuff so i was really really stoked right and then we all the band kind

of collapsed because we went to college and everyone went to different schools and but over breaks we kind of got a little better and we made some demos with it with that same guy andrew weiss and then we got signed to twin tone records Records, which was like the Replacements label and Soul Asylum's label. And we were kind of barely a band at that point because we were all just college kids and we didn't live together. But we kind of got it together and made a record and we kind of started to suck then.

And when you got tight, things got tight. I mean, we kind of got tight. We were just really obnoxious and we kind of got tight we were just we were just really obnoxious and and uh we kind of we kind of blew it like really yeah i think but those were the records those those were like while you were in college or just post-college that's when the skunk records came out not when you were kids no yeah yeah yeah in in in college like we had had you know we were playing in senior year of high school and doing these shows and then we got the music together

over the course of like freshman sophomore year of college and then i think i think the first skunk record came out in 89 right like that and then we that was a really weird time but like put it this way like by the time that we broke up i felt like some sort of grizzled veteran you know and i was like 21 i was like really bitter super bitter. It was everybody's fault. But there's got to be people out there that are like, those skunk records were the best. You know who really likes this? And I'm fully fucking name dropping,

but every time I see him, he's really sweet about it. Jack Black really likes skunk. He does? I don't know. He was here the last time I was here. Yeah, he's fucking awesome. He really likes it. So some people, he was here the last time I was here. Yeah. He's, he's fucking awesome. Uh, he really likes it. So some people,

we do, we do have a couple of fans. They're cute. Like the vocals are goofy. Um, but there's a lot of ideas going on. There's, there's a lot.

Yeah. But anyway, so, so then I quit. I dropped out of college, skunk imploded and I just didn't know what to do with myself. And I thought that I was just done with music. I was really despondent.

And then I got a job in New York working for CMJ which is like this college music journal. Right, that was huge. They used to put out packages for the CMJ, for the, what's that? The thing. The big thing. Yeah, yeah, which was like was basically what South by Southwest is

now. Right, they'd be at Brownies and the Mercury Lounge and everywhere and I used to get those packages of CMJ collections of bands. Yeah, yeah, exactly, like compilations. So here you were a guitar player, and you got a gig, you got a job. I get a job, but I'm like post-music. I was just kind of embarrassed about everything, about how Skunk went down.

I just thought that everybody hated us. So you were hanging up your guitar? I totally did, it was awesome. It was like, was like i don't know you're like fuck this drama you know like yeah i was really yeah and then um but then i was kind of knocking around new york and somebody heard that i was a bass player this guy named dave reed heard i was a bass player and even though i was a guitar player and and he was like he's like you want to start I'm starting this band uh with James Lowe from Live Skull who's a band that I really liked yeah and I was like sure yeah I play bass so then I kind of I I came in at a uh I sort of came in like okay I'm just gonna pretend I never played in a band I'm gonna play in somebody else's band

it's gonna be a kind of music that bass yeah i'm gonna play bass and like a really noisy kind of like this guy played with glenn branca and the band sort of sounded like like helmet but more arty and and more noisy yeah and kind of more kind of more interesting i don't know um and so then i started playing music again i met this guy james and around that time i also roadied for i was just fully humiliating myself i think the whole thing was like i don't play i'll be a road experiment in shame yeah i'm gonna beat the shit out of myself yeah totally not only am i gonna give up on my dream but i'm gonna go support others yeah in the most menial way possible exactly i'm gonna serve the you know the the you're like a jesuit yeah exactly you're this is self-punishment well so so clay tarver

uh this guy the this guy who i still do a band with at that time had a band called bullet lavolta and they were a band i remember them yeah and there's like kind of like this is around the time that before nirvana blew up all these bands were getting signed and lavolta was one of these bands that was supposed to be huge and by the time that it was that they definitely weren't going to be huge they had this kind of big tour and i roadied for them and i became friends with clay his band broke up and clay moved to new york and we went out karaoke and this was when there wasn't karaoke machines right pre-karaoke machines when there's there's a band there's on ninth street a place called candy b1 that had a live Japanese band

that knew like 2,000 songs and you would just get up in front of the band. That was the... It was live karaoke. It was live karaoke, but that's all karaoke really was, was live was just like you get to be the singer. Yeah. I had never met the Matador

guys. Clay was friends with the Matador guys and me and Clay at this point were friends and we would like smoke pot and talk about music and stuff like that and also he was sort of humiliated and burnt out and playing music and we karaoke and we did Bridge Over Troubled Water

you too and then Clay was like we should do a band really that was it and the other guy who was there was Chris from Matador, was the other dude that we were partying with that night. And that was how this band Chavez got started. That was the birth of Chavez?

Straight up, yeah. Chavez is one of these bands where I was way late. Somebody told me about him. And then I started seeing you on Twitter. And then I started seeing you on records. And I didn't know who the fuck you were. And then everyone's like, well, he was Chavez and who everyone is. I don't know who everyone is.

Twitter. And then we start talking to each other on Twitter. And you know Blake Mills. So now I got to get the Chavez records. So I go down to Florida to visit my mother with the double album with all the Chavez stuff. And I'm just running. I'm jogging. I'm listening to that shit.

Oh, cool. I plow it into my brain. I'm like, I got toging, I'm listening to that shit. Oh, cool. I plowed into my brain, I'm like, I gotta get a handle on this guy. But then that guy doesn't match up with the dude who's playing with Billy and Blake on Oh Well. Right. Doesn't match up with the Bonnie Prince Billy that I listened to Superwolf last night. Oh, cool.

And then like then Endless Boogie and then like and then then I start looking up your shit and I'm like, who the fuck doesn't this guy play with? Well, so it kind of went like this. So with chavez so we started the band yeah and i got a day job working for a pr company that a guy called steve martin i know i i work with them yeah steve martin the asshole not the jerk as they say that's right yeah um he he had this idea he was an agnostic front and he was in some other cool bands and and he was And this is when all of our friends' bands were getting signed to major labels. And Steve had this idea, like, let's start a PR company so we could represent our friends. You were there at the beginning of Nasty Little Man?

Yeah, yeah. So you were there. You were kind of part of it. This was like you not committing to music still. Yes, yeah, totally. It was, again, serving. And part of the game was not telling anybody that I was in a band because I wanted to be professional. So you're secretly doing Chavez.

Pretty much, yeah. And doing PR for who? We did the Beastie Boys. We did Dinosaur Jr. This is early on. So all of them knew you as the guy at the office? Kind of, yeah. Josh from Queens didn't know that I played guitar for years.

Josh Homme? Yeah. A lot of people that I was friends with, I just wouldn't tell them that I play because I thought it'd be kind of... But you were secretly jamming? Yeah. And Chavez did well. So we ended up doing pretty good.

But we had this whole thing. That band was like, we had decided that we wouldn't do anything that we did not want to do, meaning that we wouldn't play with a band that we didn't like, that we wouldn't go on tour forever if there wasn't a demand for it that we wouldn't stay on some junkies floor you know what i mean tell me about the drummer that james he's the best because like somebody called it math rock and yeah i don't think it doesn't fit that's just racist because james is chinese i think that's that's why oh really i think so yeah i just like i don't even know what it is but when i think of math rock i think of king crim. So I was trying to place it together.

I couldn't hear it. It frustrated me at the time. Actually, you know, David Kleiler invented math rock to describe the noise band, Wider, that I played in because that had a lot of weird parts. And David Kleiler, I swear to God, he called it math rock as a diss, as a joke. He would pretend to have a calculator when he was watching us. Which band? This band, Wider. That was the noise band that I played in

when I didn't know what I was doing. Right, okay. That's when you do a noise band. Yeah. And they were really cool. They were really great. But they were complicated. And so this guy, Dave,

would pretend to have a calculator at our shows and he'd be calculating it and then he'd kind of give the look like, oh yeah, you guys are good. So he was being a dick. He was being a dick. And then people started straight face like there's a genre called math rock you know which was beyond me and then shabba started getting called that i really do think it's because we could play we had a chinese drummer you know i mean we were just trying to do and we still are just trying to do like, kind of like the interesting, or the weird parts of Blue Acer Cult,

or like Cheap Trick, you know? You know, Dream Police, the big buildup in Dream Police. Or like Rocks, Aerosmith, like this kind of like, we want to just kind of play evil rock, just do our own take. You just want the build part? Yeah, and just like the high drama, but without being like, we just, that's our thing.

So Chavez is doing that and you're doing publicity. I'm doing publicity. I'm doing Chavez. Where do you learn how to finger pick from Sam Dillon? That was around,

around that, okay, so around that time, my friend Dan, who was one of the guys who went to Hampshire College, which is how I know Sam, Dan was-

Hampshire College, fucking hippie college. Oh man, I know. Tell me about it. That's the one in Amherst, right? Yeah. Hampshire College fucking hippie college. Oh man, I know. Tell me about it. That's the one in Amherst, right? Yeah. There's Reed in Hampshire,

Reed in Oregon, And then there's another one that closed, Antioch. That one was so hippie that they just imploded themselves. Everyone was majoring in leaving school? Yeah, for real. It just straight doesn't exist anymore.

I had dropped out of college and all my friends were going to Hampshire and they were friends with Sam Dillon and they were the anti hippie contingent. And they were really into like death metal and noise and swans and all this kind of music. And Sam was like not a hippie at all. This is Jacob's older brother. Correct. Yeah.

And anyway, we got to be friends. Correct. Yeah. And anyway, we got to be friends. And in the quest for extreme music, somebody found a Charlie Patton record. Oh, Weevil Blues. Yeah. And yeah, there's that song. And my friend Dan Margulies, who's this genius historian guy now, he got us into old time

music. So we started going to to he started going to these festivals at the uh these bluegrass festivals yeah yeah this one in charlotte michigan which is like we were the only young people there and so every year we would go to this festival and my friends started to learn how to play and sam just like took to finger picking and i remember when i saw him do it i my mind was completely blown i was like how the fuck do you do that how do you do that and i've been listening to stuff you know i've been listening to drake and you know like i've been listening to finger picking stuff like and i love but he was doing like almost ragtime

finger picking yeah it was just like i mean and like i also love leo kottke like that six and twelve but i just i just assumed it was impossible to do i can't do it yeah and but dude you could totally learn i mean yeah it's like juggling through repetition? You get it? Yeah, I could show you like one pattern. And that's what Sam showed me, two patterns. And everything that I do is based off of these two patterns. And it took me like a week. And I remember it was the most frustrating thing

because you want to do it so bad. And it is like juggling. Right, and eventually you get that third ball. You get that really slow. Yeah, yeah. And dude, it opens up. Sam put it this way. Sam goes, you know why there are old guys sitting on the porch

for hours and hours drinking themselves happily to death. He's like, because they know how to do this one thing. And he's like, he's, that's all he said. I was like, okay. You know, I wonder if his dad can do it. You know, weirdly he can't, he doesn't on a, he doesn't sparingly, but he does on a buckets of rain. Does that sound?

How about on? Yeah. What about on Kar How about on... Yeah. What about on Carina Carina? Yeah, that too. Yeah. But he doesn't do it... He rarely does it. It's weird.

Well, it seems like at some point he gave up his fingers altogether. Yeah. I mean, he doesn't even play guitar anymore at all. His hands hurt, right? Is that the deal? I don't know. You're his friend. I gotta ask.

It's so funny to me, though. It's not the deal? I don't know. You're his friend. I gotta ask. It's so funny to me, though. It's not the Dylan that plays. He plays, but he's not the guy who tried to be a musician. Yeah, he's amazing. I'm going to have to ask him if it's okay to talk about him, because he's super private. Well, we're not doing anything other than saying you learned how to play guitar. Yeah, and also, I do want to give him props, because he's one of the best musicians that I know. I love knowing that.

I love knowing that the Dylan that doesn't even deal with music is the best musician. You should have him on. He's a criminal defense attorney. He's a bad motherfucker. So I was doing Chavez, but then Chavez started to slow down a little bit. Just the finger-picking thing was just like a separate thing. But then you put down the pick and you only finger-pick? Yeah, pretty much.

Really? Because you don't really need a pick anyway. I mean, if you have to do that, you just do that use your nail do you use your thumb yeah but the finger picking i i really got into then shava is slowed down because of a bunch of different things like uh our bass players started to get get too many jobs working as a making music videos or something like which one is the writer now they're clay Okay, so Clay Tarver. He's a guitar player though, right? Yeah, me and Clay started the band. Bridge over troubled water.

Yeah, and Clay's kind of the leader, even though I sing and write the lyrics and stuff, Clay still is really the guy who drives the band and stuff. And he started getting a lot of jobs, writing jobs, because he worked at mtv and he was the guy who did the cab driver uh promos so there's a guitar player for for chavez he he wrote the oh the donald loge promos just by because he knew donald loge how do you get the other they were college roommates so that's how that happened so he's writing for him so then he

gets wrecked so what's his trajectory he clay's trajectory is is he writes a script based on the cab driver yeah which of course never gets made but a lot of people see and uh and he started getting everybody loved that script and so i think jj abrams was the guy right who started giving clay work you know crazy it's so fucking wild yeah then you lose your guitar player oh yeah so so meanwhile so he's he starts doing stuff james our drummer is this is this genius who designs. I mean, he did something with the computer mainframe of Merrill Lynch to make the chain of command a split second quicker for money things. So this is one thing that he can do. And he helped design stents.

For hearts? For hearts. He's your drummer. Yes. He wins Bessie Awards for modern dance compositions. He's so fucking advanced. So he's your drummer yes he wins bessie awards for for uh for modern dance compositions he's like so fucking advanced so he's doing his thing clay's doing his thing you're just a guitar yeah this fucking idiot you know like i was like oh i guess i'll get good at finger picking you know it's take some time to play yeah so yeah so you're still doing publicity yeah and then and

and and it was that job was really cool because i could kind of take on as much as I could take on and come and go. But right when Chavez was kind of done, I saw Andrew WK play. Yeah. And I think I had taken ecstasy for the first time. And I went up to him. And this is when Andrew just played by himself to a tape. With his white pants and his white shirt. Yeah.

And he was 18. And I was like, man man can i be your manager i mean i was i was i was high as shit and he was like okay and in like short order i got him like a really huge record deal and it was the only time i ever did anything like this and anr yeah and or managing you know and so it was his first one the bloody nose yeah yeah and and uh and you know you know, I made a little chunk of money because he got a record deal. And so, like, then what happened? Oh, yeah.

And then I ran into Billy Corgan, who was a big Skunk fan back in the day. Really? Yes. And he asked me if I wanted to do a project with him. And we ended up doing that for two years. What was the name of that band? It was called The Swan.

Right. It was really fun. Like, the first half of it was really, really fun. In a year, we recorded 100 songs. We just played lots and lots of music, and it was really, really fun. You think he's a good guitar player? He's a great guitar player. Yeah.

Yeah, he's incredible. But then that thing imploded because I think really he didn't really want to do what we were doing. I think it was kind of an experiment for him. What were you doing? I don't really know. Is it on record?

It's on record. I've never listened to the record, but some people like it. I remember that the record took a really long time to make. I think I wasn't the guy that he hoped I was and maybe vice versa for me and him and stuff like that. It got kind of weird, but he's a character. Got kind of weird? Yeah. Okay.

But anyway, there's probably enough nice things so i do this thing for like two years and and then uh then all of a sudden i'm in my early 30s and that thing's done and all and i'd all of a sudden i was like a professional musician you know what i mean which i swore i'd never be because well now you've managed you've uh you've done some a and r you've delivered that i was like in a kind of right you know how to finger pick with Sam. You were in Chavez, and now you just finished with Corrigan. And then I remember I had done, and also I started playing with,

oh, you know what I did actually when Chavez slowed down? I started playing with Bonnie Prince Billy. I started playing with Will, which was a huge, huge thing. We had a mutual friend. Who was that? The mutual friend? Yeah. Britt Walford, the drummer from Slint, this band.

Slint. Yeah, who I went to Slint, this band. Slint. Yeah, who I went to college with, actually. So much college. Well, that's, I guess, where it all starts. Most bands are upper middle class kids. Yeah, who should be doctors. Some of them, apparently, will do both, like your drummer. Yeah.

You make a stint. He's amazing. Yeah. But anyway, so I started playing with will we met through through brit yeah and then then the billy corgan thing all of a sudden i'm done with the billy corgan thing and i thought i was gonna make some money yeah doing what just from publishing stuff yeah and like nothing all of a sudden i did a tour with will i was in i was in uh tasmania at the tasmanian devil park and somehow i i was again i i was still pretty spacey about money and just thought things would

work out man yeah you know yeah man i was like yeah you know i was in this band you know like i'm gonna get some money yeah yeah and uh manager says it's gonna come through you know so i remember going i wanted to buy a t-shirt at the tasmanian devil park and i put in my my card in the atm and i had like negative 25 in my bank account and i was in fucking tasmania and i remember that that was like this incredible moment the moment yeah i was like whoa i'm completely fucked you know and and i remember not to like i was embarrassed i didn't know what to do you know like like and, and I'm like, walk out of like, kind of ashen face. Will's like, are you okay? I was like, yeah.

Are we just, did we get getting cash on this tour? You know, that tone. Just wondering. I mean, I was so fucked. It was incredible, you know? And I'm like, and I didn't have a day job. And like, I just didn't know what to do. And then Will kind of sensed that i was

motherfucked and yeah and and he uh he i remember he wrote me and he said hey um i have a really big show in london that pays my money you want to just have me and you play play the show right and and then i was like thanks yeah that's great yeah and then then he sent an email that said challenge and there were two lyrics and and he was like and he was like how about you make songs out of these lyrics and we'll play them at the london show so i was like okay you know and and i've never been asked to do that uh so i did and and that's sort of how superwolf got started was was we played these songs and it was fucking terrifying because i was just playing loud rock bands and all of a sudden just me and a singer with some song that i just made up and it's like a really big crowd and and it was it was terrifying but exciting fucking a yeah super exciting so that's just it's just you and him on that record

and oh and our friend pete townsend got that one yeah uh pete townsend from louisville plays plays drums on that and and it's a pretty record. Thank you. Yeah. So Will really helped me out when I just didn't know what to do. And then through that Superwolf record, Rick Rubin, I guess, heard it. Yeah. And called me up out of the blue and just asked me to start. What did he say about the record? He said the nicest things in the world. I would sound like I was lying if I actually quoted it,

because I'd sound like a dick. But he said really, really nice things about it. You know, like I was just like, like my end of the conversation was, yeah? Yeah. Really? Whoa, thanks. No way.

This is really Rick Rubin. Dude, wow. Fuck. Fuck. Cool. Really? Really? You know?

And then, and he said, you you know he said he wanted to see if i was available to to play in records and you know so i said fuck no getting in hell no no i didn't i was like yeah of course yeah and uh and then i got a call like a couple of days later you know i was like is um i'm calling from rick rubin's office is this matt sweeney yeah checking your availability to plan on johnny cash uh sessions and i was like i I'm calling from Rick Rubin's office. Is this Matt Sweeney? Yeah. Checking your availability to plan on Johnny Cash sessions. And I was like, I'm assuming these are overdubs because Johnny Cash had died. Yeah. And then there's like this beat on the other end.

They're like, Mr. Cash recorded two albums worth of material with the express purpose of them being finished after his death. Are you interested? So I said, yeah. And then I kind of asked around a little bit about exactly what was going on and sure sure enough he had done like 20 songs at his house when he was going you know and uh they had been sitting on these on these recordings kind of dreading having to do it but it was agreed like this right it was like his will you know right like uh his last wish yeah and

and I was the and because rick liked this record that i made with will i was the new guy and everybody else was like the guys who played and all it was basically it was my heartbreakers yeah yeah you know and so i've i've and i've never done any fucking studio stuff you know like that so it was insane you know like like so i show up you know and uh with your guitar you know what i didn't bring a guitar because i was like i don't know what i'm supposed to do i don't i didn't even own an acoustic guitar and and uh and i figured they're gonna have a lot of guitars it's like rick rubin right and also i kind of figured well i can't bring anything to the session i can't you

know what i mean like i figured that i just have to improv right which ended up kind of really working out well um because i didn't have to improv, which ended up kind of really working out well because I didn't have to carry anything. So it was really nice. Did they have guitars? Yeah, there's like fucking tons. It's like, of course, it's like, can I use this guitar?

Yeah, sure. Like good ones? Yeah, do you like this guitar? Yeah, you can't just like, yeah. It's like a hundred guitars. It's gross. And it was, I remember into rick rubin's house where where he this was in hollywood where he used to do a lot of recordings and and and i went in

through the basement and i heard this laughing from from the i just found found my way and i took like a weird door i took like a side door entrance and i didn't want to meet anybody i just want the houdini house? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. That's, I mean, that's not, that's not,

no, not, not the, oh, his actual house. The 1331 Miller drive, which I think he's gotten rid of, but yeah,

not the Houdini house, this other house, which was, which also was a similarly fabulous haunted Hollywood mansion. Right. And I remember going in through the basement and not telling anybody I had arrived and, and hearing this laughing. They're hearing this like, oh, my God.

Like this kind of hillbilly laughter. And I walk in and there's this guy sitting there looking at a computer screen that I can't see what's on the screen. And he's like, who are you? This scary guy. And I was like, I'm Matt Swinney. He's like, oh, you're the new guy. He's like, I was like, yeah, I guess I am. He's like, well, I hope you're ready

to make the best goddamn record of your life. And I was like, yeah. He's like, well, I'm Fergie. I've worked with Johnny Cash for 30 years and I am so tired of doing this. This is killing me. Because he's like, bro, this is like really, this is sad shit.

I hope you're ready to get into this. I mean, you know, I mean, he was really like, he just like, and that was another big moment for me. I was like, wow, I have to make a to get into this. I mean, he was really like, he just like, and that was another big moment for me. I was like, wow, I have to make a record for this guy. Because this is the guy who is seeing through his kind of mentors thing. And he was the only guy from Johnny Cash's world, I think, that Rick brought along.

So, oh, and then he was laughing at the computer screen because he had a picture of jimmy martin who's this hillbilly singer yeah in front of like a thousand dead squirrels yeah he's like looking at like like hillbilly porn or whatever like and and then and then all these other guys come in it's like i couldn't believe it was it was the most surreal thing like it's the heartbreakers then like they show up you know and all of them yeah yeah i'm freaking out you know and then and then i've never met him before you just say i am mad yeah i was just like this idiot like and i never that they have no idea they don't know who the fuck i am i've never heard

yeah yeah they don't know will them shop is what no they don't know any of that stuff so and so i'm just this guy you know and and uh and then it was just johnny cash's voice to a click track and we just sit there and figure out the songs. And we ended up recording. Just the melody? No guitar? They would, you know, it would be like, we'd know it would be in the key of C. And they had isolated the tracks.

And he would just have his friends play when he was recording. He'd just have his friends play just like a guide track. And so then those guide tracks were white clean. And so we would just come. Raw voice. Raw voice. It must have been haunting. It was fucking cool. And so we would just come. Raw voice. Raw voice. It must have been haunting. It was fucking cool.

And we just did it all live. And we ended up, it was incredibly fun. You know what I mean? First time you've ever been in a studio. And you're in there with. On that level, yeah. Basically with the heartbreakers. Yeah.

Playing to the disembodied voice of Johnny Cash. Oh my God. It was really strange. And, but that was. Were these original songs or covers? Both. Yeah. A lot of covers and some originals. Wow.

Yeah, and it was cool. And it worked so well that then Rick would let me stay late and me and Ferg would kind of mess around with that song, Ain't No Grave and God's's gonna cut you down were two that we kind of got to be like really mess with you know and like like i kind of turned into a minor key song even though it was a major key song and stuff i mean just rick was so fucking nice that he let me it was just you and rick and ferg yeah and then rick would leave me like yeah if you want to try something go ahead you know on those tracks is it only you and john no no i mean it's smoky

and mike and stuff like that but uh mike campbell smoky hormel who's who's plays on tons of rick stuff and smoky made it all these guys were so nice to me that's the other thing is like smoky and benmont were so friendly to me and they you know they could have been total jerks if they wanted to sure and rick had the best advice i was like so can i just play whatever i want he goes yeah do whatever you want we could always hit a race yeah you know and i was like oh right i guess i can just do that but i ended up being able to like i'm featured on on five and six like i could there's there's um there's a lot of a lot of you hearts a lot of me on there on the on the uh cash five yeah five and six yeah posthumous ones yeah and then they're hard to listen to because he's dying, you know what I mean?

Like, the vocals are tough. I mean, I'm proud of those records. I don't think that they're for everybody. Right. You know what I mean? But Ferg loves them, and Ferg, who's Johnny Cash's guy. He loved him.

That's what I, you know. So then I just started working for Rick a lot, and so I get to meet all these, and I live in New York, and then I get to go out to LA and play with like Cat Stevens. But what was it? Who else did you play with?

Neil Diamond too? Yeah, yeah. Did you do those sessions? That's how I got my acoustic actually is Neil Diamond gave me this insane acoustic guitar. And I always had this dream. I was like, I can't afford a Martin. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But like, I was like, maybe someday some rich guy will like give me a Martin. I don't know. Right. How else would it happen? Right. And then after I was friends with Neil, I went by one give me a Martin. I don't know. Right. How else would it happen? Right. And then after I was friends with Neil, I went by one time.

Me and Smokey went by his studio because we both happened to be in town. He's like, yeah, come by the studio. And his son was getting rid of all these guitars. He's like, yeah, look at this one. And he says, this is a beautiful beat up Martin. In LA? Yeah. Yeah. Like right next to Cedar Sinai.

It's Sam Cooke's old studio. It's the Liberty Records studio. Neil's been in there since the early 70s. And it's sam cook's old studio uh it's the it's the liberty record studio he's been in there since the early 70s and it's fucking awesome it's like frozen in time wow like 1978 like amazing so you go over there after you record with neil so he knows you yeah yeah yeah yeah the rick again so the rick things it just became this thing where it was like i couldn't believe that it was happening you know at any session i just couldn't believe which ones did you do as far as like crazy legends that i couldn't believe like like neil diamond cat stevens rick recorded cat stevens yeah the last one yeah uh he he ended

up they he did the raw tracks with rick and then he ended up finishing it in different studios and but neil diamond in particular like i'm i'm crazy about his music. Really? I love Neil Diamond. Always have. Really? Always. Yeah, yeah. Because that's a pretty sparse record, right? Oh, yeah. The record that we did, there's like 10-minute long, really sparse, weird songs.

It was so much fun. It was really, really cool. So you get to know Neil. Yeah. He's a pal. He's so... Dude, he sometimes texts me and shit. Oh, really?

It's fucking... I was recording with a rapper recently. He's a pal. Dude, he sometimes texts me and shit. Oh, really? I was recording with a rapper recently, and I was like, I just got a text from Neil Diamond. I could tell the rapper was just kind of bummed. Oh, right. I was just kind of like, I just won. Acting.

If rap is about being cool. What rapper? It was LP, who's great. He's a really good friend. I love working with him. And he does a thing called run the jewels now which is great i really recommend it it's kind of blowing up you and blake mills are buddies yeah actually yeah i brought like and i actually introduced blake to rick because which was again classic kind of career suicide because that guy is a wizard yeah you know it's like i do pencil sketches and he's like a sculptor right you know guitar wise um rick didn't know him either so what does rick just sit

up in the mountain i mean he gets he gets he knows guys and then he he has guys that he trusts right and stuff and so like in this case this was a kid rock record and and uh and he rick was like yeah do you know do you know anybody else who'd be good for guitar you know i was like well this guy blake you know that was blake's first rick session and then all of a sudden i stopped getting rick sessions and then blake was no no well actually a couple times but that's fine because i live in new york yeah uh and you know what's neat is actually blake he's the best guitar player in the world but i I, I, he's, he doesn't step on, I never felt like, right, right, right. Like what, what's the Amadeus situation? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There was a moment though. I do remember. I was like,

is this going to be this? Did I just completely fuck myself? You know, you got to tour with Cat Stevens. How the fuck did, Oh yeah. So what's great about the Rick things is that sometimes I'll hit it off with, with the artists and then, then I'll just kind of do stuff outside of the Rick world, just play shows and do some stuff. So, I mean, again, it was like the biggest golden pile of shit that I stepped in with,

well, I don't want to call Rick a golden pile of shit. It wasn't lucky. The lucky thing was that he wrote the record. Yeah. I mean, that's the weird thing about it. It had integrity to it. It was like, who's that guy? Yeah, it was cool. And also, we didn't do any press for that's the weird thing about it. It had integrity to it. It was like, who's that guy? Yeah, it was cool.

And also, we didn't do any press for that record, the Superwolf record. That's the record I heard you on. Yeah. It's been fucking 10 years. It's so crazy. That's 10 years old? Yeah.

Was it you and Blake and Billy Gibbons who did Oh Well? Yeah, that was a thing where I, Rick had got, oh yeah, that's another obvious one, Billy Gibbons, as far as the Rick thing goes. When we were working on the cast stuff did he do a top record yeah he did the last one he did yeah oh that's right that's good it is good yeah um did you hear did you hear Billy play fucking the ballad of Billy the Kid on fucking awesome why doesn't he do a whole record I know well so okay so dude so so that that's been an obsession of mine but now let me just like preface this by saying so you heard billy play that thing on my

on my podcast yes and incredible so i was talking to rick about billy gibbons he's like well i'm friends with him but i never really checked out cc top like hardcore i was like really you know and he's like yeah and i was like dude the best band ever like the first five records yes there are the greatest things ever yeah yes and and uh i I mean, I can't, I'm obsessed. And so Rick started talking to Billy about making a record. Right. And then I sent Rick an email saying, you know, if you're talking to Billy about making a record, I think you should talk to him about Peter Green because as far as I can tell, that could be a good dialogue opener.

You know what I mean? Like as far as. That should be the dialogue opener with every guitar player. I know, it's true. And Peter Green, for listeners, is the... Well, they know. My listeners know.

I never shut up about Peter Green. Yeah, yeah. The original Fleetwood Mac guitar player. The original Fleetwood Mac guy, the best... The wizard of blues. The best blues player. Yeah. And somehow it doesn't sound like

a white guy trying to be black. I don't know what it is. It's transcendent. It's just transcendent. It is, right? Yeah, absolutely. So Gibbons sees that email that I wrote to rick and he's like billy wants to meet you he wants to he wants to write with you and i you know it was the great you know the greatest phone call i've ever gotten you know right so i got instructions from rick yeah meet

up with him and and play music that he likes get him back into music because it seems like he sort of hasn't been that inspired, you know? Right. So this was like my job, you know? To get... To fucking hang out with Billy Gibbons and like listen to Fleet, like listen to the Boston Tea Party,

Fleetwood Mac, you know, bootlegs. Is that what you played with him? Oh, fuck yeah. Well, we were just like, Jesper from Endless Boogie, who's a friend of mine who's like a music, you know... He's like a crazy record collector, right? Yeah, well, Paul Major and Jesper.

Yeah, two of the guys in the band are like... In Endless Boogie. Yes. They're out in the island, right? No, actually, I called the record Long Island just because I thought it would be cool. Oh. But no, they're all around here. But Jesper is a great...

I made this crazy mixtape with my friend who has the libraries of music and stuff. Yeah. And he's an endless boogie guitar player? He's an endless boogie. And we made five CDs called Vibe Action for Billy Gibbons of just inspirational... Ripping him from vinyl.

Vinyl, everything. Yeah. And that was sort of like, hey, Billy, I'm this guy, Matt, who wrote the thing. You're trying to reprime the Gibbons pump. And dude, he took to it. It was like, hey, Billy, you know, I'm this guy, Matt, who wrote the thing. You're trying to reprime the Gibbons pump. And dude, he took to it. It was like, yeah, dude, check out this. And we'd listen to music and then play a bit.

And we did this for a week. And it was the greatest. I mean, I remember at the end of the first day, Gibbons was like, well, this just couldn't have gone any better. I was like, I can't fucking believe this. This is awesome. And then. What were some

of the other songs you were playing i mean what was i playing i mean like he knew the peter green shit yeah he knew the peter green but he hadn't listened to it for a while but he's right you know he's like this is the that was it that was his guy yeah yeah and then a lot of african rock like there's a good compilation called africa rocks a band called witch a band called amenas rich i know which i just got they just reissued their vinyl yeah yeah that's great yeah yeah um so you know just like kind of stuff that i knew that gibbons would like but maybe hadn't heard because that that's what's cool about rock music it is it is infinite the amount of stuff that that that you know that you haven't heard right

that's great you know and you just sat with him and you'd follow you'd get the guitars out and you'd follow him we would just kind of make shit up yeah and and uh it should be noted none of these songs ever got used and uh but we had this incredible hang then i went back to do it again and the vibe was completely different and and gibbons didn't seem to be into it anymore and then i and then they started working on the record and i was like shit did shit, did I just blow it with Billy Gibbons somehow? And then he met Blake. And then Blake was like, Gibbons wants to do something with me. And he was like, let's just do it. And then there was the full circle back to doing the single.

Yeah, and doing a Fleetwood Mac thing. And I was hoping that that would be the beginning of something where we could just i think he's afraid yeah i i i he's so complicated he's so brilliant that guy and but it's just interesting that because like that rick rubin's easy top record it's like it's in the tradition of those original rick rubin records where it's like we're gonna we're gonna make as easy top record the way it used to be yeah yeah yeah and so it's good it's okay and his riffs are good right but it's weird because he's so like these guys get older and you so want them to to honor their their their depth right and i think a lot of them are just nervous to do it there's that and

also you forget i've learned this from talking to these older guys like i asked gibbons about those 70s records right oh god like, oh, God. We'd just be sweating in a room, having to hang out with each other and just working and working. I was like, yeah. Yeah, yeah. But those memories probably aren't that great. I guess so.

That was something to be transcended. Yeah. I always hear about Skinner working in a warehouse there that was so hot and it was hot on purpose and they when al cooper found them they were just these sweaty guys that have been pounding these songs so hard they yeah they knew them in their sleep yeah and and so you're like you know what guys why don't you get back to that they're like because i don't want to i fucking hated doing that yeah i mean that that's one thing i found and also a lot of people people's great work was they were kind of miserable in their personal lives.

Then they become fucking millionaires. They live under a rock of wealth and fame. And they've got a sound. Yeah. But I really think, I swear I have noticed this,

that guys who are hugely successful, they're not interested in people who aren't hugely successful. They're not interested in the records that they made that didn't sell.

It's just, I think it's just something about money and, and, and power that makes people, um, not interested in going for something that doesn't equal money. I swear. Yeah.

But, but after a certain point, like, I mean, they already made their money. I mean, it's not like that, that ZZ Top record didn't make money.

but they still think that way. I swear. I know. They still think they're going to get through the next ZZ Top record.'t make money. I know, but they still think that way. I know, they still think they're going to do the next ZZ Top record. It's over. I know, I know. And also it's like, as far as I know, most of the things that end up really popping

are things that you just made because you think were fucking awesome. Right, right, right. And then people pick up on it. But I've just seen this with some bigger acts who are just used to how things go like yeah we need a hit that that whole mentality you know yeah but it's weird because it's so gone like levon helm knew better than others you know before he died and he was recording those i think he recorded on vanguard yeah yeah i mean it's it's for the people that

want to find that yeah i mean you got to stop thinking about hits i know you know and it's like even the rolling stones will write make new songs or a new record but like when i talked to keith richards for 10 minutes you know i said to him why don't you guys make a blues record he's like well it's been kicking around for a while it's like we'll just do it because if you listen to love you live the elmo combo side yeah it's like where's that fucking record with that outfit that they can make in five fucking seconds. In a second. I know, but it's, again, I'm sure. Did you ever see that thing where Ronnie and Keith played with Dylan on the Sun City record?

No. Like, it was weird. Because I remember seeing it at the concert when they recorded. Like early 80s shit. Well, yeah, it was thrown together. It was Bob Dylan in the middle of Keith and I think Ronnie. And they all had guitars. And it was pretty great. And then there was another song on that record called Silver and Gold that I think Keith played on.

That record, the Sun City record, is kind of interesting. There's some weird players on there. But I just don't like, it's like you guys have already done it. You're done with that. Yeah, yeah. You won. Yeah. So now honor your roots.

I would be great. It's this, I don't know. I don't get it either. But I just came to understand that it has something to do with these guys not wanting to lose money, not wanting to appear unsuccessful. I think it's fear. Yeah, it's fear. It's all fear. It's absolutely fear.

For sure. For sure. You know what I mean? I don't know if there's anything we can do. unsuccessful i think it's a fear yeah it's all fear it's absolutely fear for sure for sure you know what i mean i don't know if there's anything we can do like that like i i just hold on to that little i have it on my desktop that givens thing yeah i was so excited because i was listening to that to that interview just enjoying it and then then when you did i was like no oh my god oh my god and it's so fucking good so good it's so good it's he's like and i don't want to appear disrespectful talking about the fucking millionaires blah blah but i do think it's true It's like, hmm. And I don't want to appear disrespectful talking about fucking millionaires, blah, blah, blah. But I do think it's true.

It's like they get used to success. I think it's more being entrenched in what they think they're supposed to do. Yeah. Like, you know, because it's very hard. Even when you listen to Tom Petty, it's like, this is a guy, you know, one of the greatest American songwriters in the world. And then, you know, where you're greatest American songwriters in the world. And then, you know,

where you're expected to keep churning out this thing. Right. And they've all gone through it. And I think that's still in their head.

They think that's the thing they churn out. Yeah. And I don't know that, like, I don't know that Billy would necessarily even see that big

of a difference between 70s Easy Top and what they evolved into. I think he knows that the syncopated drum beat was not a good thing right and his answer to that is is that we were trying to get chicks to dance to it which is fine right you can you know but like i don't think he sees any difference between

any of that i think he would just want yeah i don't it's easy talk about it like we would have like kind of long kind of circular conversations about it and then it really did occur to me i was like i'm just some fucking like like i'm gonna i think to them like i'm gonna a guy like me is like an obscurist yeah who's into things that are cool and and eventually the guys are like you know what just because it's you're just this guy who thinks that things are cool and you just you know like if it's obscure it's good you know what i'm not like that right that's that's what the successful guy says yeah you know what i mean yeah and and to be fair gibbons really does love a lot of no he's you know and also he loves a lot of weird shit for sweetheart yeah oh yeah well he yeah he was weird shit you know like yeah that story he told in the podcast about like hanging

out with hendrix and hendrix dragging the stereo down the hall to hear like jeff beck yeah they sit there and go like what the fuck is jeff beck doing so awesome i mean dude what about gibbons talking about alex chilton yeah i mean big star and fucking zz top were making records at the same studio at the same time which just blows my mind you know it's crazy man yeah i remember gibbons actually this is interesting he goes alex chilton now he was interesting he uh he was a guy who who really could have been very successful but he chose to be a homeless so that i think that like you know you forget like in in our in the way that music is fragmented in the way that you came up in music that you know these guys came from the time where like we're gonna make a billion dollars yeah yeah yeah i mean i think that's probably right yeah you know

yeah i mean yeah so guys like that i would i mean i love it i think that billy's absolutely got it in him for sure i mean he's a god he is he's just so great so tell me about this endless boogie thing that was another one of those records or i got out of nowhere what label's that on that's on a little label called no quarter which is a really small but really good label somebody sent me that record and like you know i'm going through records and it's so it's weird with me because i get like a lot of records yeah and i'll throw them all on for one play yeah and and occasionally like you know throw something on and i'm just go about my business and i'll walk back into the room like the fuck is this that was like that was that record yeah endless boogie was one of my it was the dark it was the

weird sort of mountain long island yeah oh yeah yeah. And that's a painting from Norway from like 1908. And it looks exactly like Paul Major. It looks like the guy who's in... Okay. Yeah, it's freaky. Endless Boogie was a band that started as like a fun bunch of record collectors playing music in a rehearsal space. That was my rehearsal space.

And they started playing shows out after years of playing just in a old guys right yeah paul's like 60 what's his name again paul major that's that's his christian name paul major and he's like he's sort of notorious yes yeah yeah he kind of defined him he kind of invented a record market of uh what are they people call real people music or private press records like records that major labels didn't make that people actually made themselves let me they made a lot of those are being reissued now yeah van a for yeah paul kind of invented people finding that shit yeah oh really yeah he's he's so cool um and so sweet like the dark album or do you know that yeah paul found that record because you can't find the real one i mean the real one's worth something like five thousand dollars right so

like like there's i'm getting a lot of those reassures because you know do you know you know you must you know daniel cook do you know daniel cook dan cook yeah yeah yeah well he's he's got his joint now is out in la it's right around the corner from me oh fucking dude say hi to daniel he's fucking awesome great guy yeah that's amazing but he gets all these re-releases of those records yeah and i get them through him you're stoked that's yeah yeah because you have. Yeah, exactly. So Paul and Jesper from Boogie were those guys for me who were just like always turning me on to stuff

and they had this band and they were my favorite band forever. Like I had seen, I remember I saw Crazy Horse and Endless Boogie on the same night and I swear to God, there was,

it was, I could not pick one from the other as far as like what was godlike guitar really perfect yeah yeah Paul can really do it yeah and then then I just started playing when they started making records I started playing with them and kind of sort of co-producing the records and stuff so I kind of ended up being the third guitar player in Endless Boogie and that's so that's the thing I do whenever I can I make records with them whenever I can well I guess my question to you

then as a guitar player and as somebody who i appreciate your guitar playing because you're not you know you're not a stand-up out front you know showboat like no i like to and you it seems like you've learned from you know from insecurity and and sort of evolving through well there's that but there's also the reality of like showing up to do those cash records and realizing that you can't be a showboat. And you're up against some real shit, and you've got to be sort of honest about how you play, right? That you found the honesty of how you play. My grandmother was influential because she was really into accompanist.

She worked for David O. Selznick, like the Gone with the Wind producer. She was really into movies. And she would always talk about the piano player, like about how beautiful this piano playing is against this vocal and how the music's almost invisible and stuff. And I remember that was kind of stuck in my head. I remember I had that in mind

when all of a sudden I was with these great singers. I was like, okay, don't play when they're singing. That's what you do. Not time for lead licks. Yeah, and then play something off of what, when they're not singing, play something simple that's sort of like what they sang. That's my fucking, that's what I do.

You know, I mean, like, and that's kind of what most, I think, people would do. But I never thought about that. Right. I never thought about that, I never thought about that, like as simple as that. And that's what I learned. I started picking up on that

from playing with Will Oldham and stuff. He taught me a lot about how to play with a singer. You know what I mean? Right. So that's kind of what I do. And also it's like, it's a queen sound. Yeah, yeah. Even if the guitar is dirty, you know what I mean. Yeah, yeah's like, it's a queen sound. Yeah. Yeah. Even if the guitar is dirty,

you know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Cause again,

I don't, I'm, I'm such a Luddite and a spaz that I can't deal with pedals. And I don't think my hearing is particularly, I'm not like, I'm not great at mixing. I'm not like a really, I'm not a,

I'm not a tone freak. And, but I think if you play with your fingers, you just, you kind of will get a good sound. And like, I wish we had some guitars. know dude i show me that thing i almost brought one well you're gonna be a town i'll we'll just come yeah you could come come do it some let's do some uh come to a comedy show yeah dude i'd love to all right i totally love to well you got to go

eat with your mom yes i do all right man good talk great thanks Thanks. Matt Sweeney. Check him out, man. Check out that Superwolf record and everything else. You know, go have a superiority burger. Do what you got to do. Go hang out with Matt. He's fun to hang out with.

Oh, justcoffee.coop. You get the WTF blend. I get a little on the back end. God, where's that fucking guitar, man? Boomer lives! Fender champ forever. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode

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